Privacy in Schools - Office of the Privacy Commissioner

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PRIVACY
Keeping You can see the word information “may” is emphasised. Just safe because the school
may release information does not mean it must. For example, many
parents/caregivers will have their telephone and address in the local
telephone directory, which is a publicly available publication. This
means that if a person rang the school and asked for the home phone
number of a parent, the school may be able to release that information.
However, it does not have to release the information. As a matter of
policy most agencies do not provide home phone numbers upon
request, even if the phone number is in the telephone directory.
Before releasing information, schools should ensure they are not in
breach of a school policy or another law or legal obligation, for example
breach of confi dentiality under a professional code of ethics (see
“Important defi nitions”, page 7).
• statistical purposes;
• research purposes; and
• ensuring that students’ educational records are accurately
maintained.
An example of an agency that has access to the NSNs is the New
Zealand Qualifi cations Authority that uses NSNs to record credits and
qualifi cations gained by learners on the National Qualifi cations
Framework.
Given the limited purposes of the NSN, schools may want to give
students a separate number or identifi er for the purposes of school
administration but should only do if this is necessary.
Principle 12 – use of personal identification numbers
A school cannot create a unique identifi er – that is a serial number or
PIN – for a student unless it is necessary to the effi ciency of the school.
If the school does apply a number to a student because it is necessary,
then this number must be unique and not the same as another agency’s
unique identifi er for that person, for example, a public library card
number or IRD number. The school cannot insist that this number be
revealed to anyone else.
An automatic numbering system by a computer on entering enrolment
information or a school library code number is not a breach of this
principle as long as the student’s name is clearly identifi able from the
input of the code number.
In 2006, the Education Act was amended to empower the Ministry of
Education to create a unique National Student Number (NSN) for every
student.
Part 30 of the Education Act 1989 sets out that the NSN can only be
used for the following purposes:
• monitoring and ensuring student enrolment and attendance;
• ensuring education providers and students receive appropriate
resourcing;
PRIVACY
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